Fried Oysters w/ Green Tomato, Sweet Corn, Pickled Okra and Blue Cheese Vinaigrette

If you are looking to make a truly Southern dish in your own home then this is it!  This is a recipe from Hank's Seafood Restaurant Cookbook.  Hank's is on list after list of a must-see restaurant if you head down to Charleston and this salad is on their current menu.  I saw this recipe about a year ago in Southern Living magazine and I have been dying to try it out so I finally bit the bullet.  My husband, who isn't a huge oyster fan, absolutely loved it -- although pretty much anything is good when it's fried.  

The recipe calls for green tomatoes, but I used regular red tomatoes because I simply couldn't find green tomatoes anywhere!  How is that possible? 

So what I love most about this salad is the pickled okra.  If you haven't had pickled okra before then good Lord, get to the store and buy a jar immediately!  It is so fantastic I could die.  I ate the entire jar in one day.  Yummy!

Fried Oysters with Green Tomato, Sweet Corn, Pickled Okra and Blue Cheese Vinaigrette (makes 4 salads)

2 c. cracker meal
1 c. cornmeal 
1 c. all purpose flour
salt and pepper
peanut oil
2 large handfuls arugula
16 oysters
4 to 8 halved pickled okra

Blue Cheese Vinaigrette
2 ears fresh corn
1/2 c. extra virgin olive oil
1 c. diced green tomato
1 1/2 c. chicken stock
2 tbsp chopped mixed herbs
3 tbsp crumbled blue cheese
1/2 c. cider vinegar
1 tsp salt
1/8 tsp pepper

1. For vinaigrette: cut corn from cobs, reserving cobs.  Heat oil in saute pan, add corn and cook 1 minute.  Cool.  Combine stock and corn cobs in saucepan.  Boil then reduce heat and simmer 15 minutes.  Pour mixture through fine wire mesh strainer.  Cool to room temperature and refrigerate.  Stir green tomato into corn and stir into stock.  Just before serving, add in herbs and blue cheese.
2.  Pour 1 and 1/2 inches oil in a cast iron skillet; heat over medium high until temperature reaches 350.  
3.  Whisk cracker meal, flours, 2 tsp salt and 1/2 tsp pepper in shallow bowl.  Dredge oysters in mixture, shaking off excess.  Fry in batches 2 to 4 minutes or until golden brown.  Drain on paper towels; sprinkle with salt and pepper.  
4.  Spoon vinaigrette onto 4 serving plates.  Top with oysters and okra. 

Poached Pear Salad w/ Blue Cheese and Cranberry

Today is a really special day for me -- it’s the one year anniversary of ChowGals!!!  For those of you that missed my introductory post, I’ll recap:  cooking is my number one passion.  I’ve been cooking and entertaining for years and I am so so pumped to have this blog to showcase what I do and show you that you can do it too!  I am so lucky to have such great readers who follow, like and pin my work!  Because of you, my name has gotten out there a little bit and I’ve had some great opportunities that have made me stretch from my comfort zone.  Thank you, readers, you make this blog even better!  

The recipe for today was part of our Charleston weekend in the beginning of April.  It was probably one of the best things we ate there: Poached Pear Salad with Blue Cheese & Cranberry from Slightly North of Broad.  

Now here’s the most important sentence of this recipe: Use. Quality. Ingredients.

This isn’t your typical restaurant salad downed in blue cheese dressing.  This is a delicate balance of flavors in their most basic form.  The salad was deconstructed on the plate so you could pick up just the right about of cheese and cranberries to complement your perfectly poached pear.  So I guess what I’m saying is this : don’t go to the store and pick up the tub of Kraft blue cheese crumbles that you would use on a “normal” salad.  Go to the gourmet cheese section and spend the extra bucks to get a nice blue cheese that is alive in it’s velvety goodness!  And the most impressive part of the salad?  The poached pear had a layer of caramelized sugar on top.  Heavenly!!!!  That can be tricky to do at home without a torch.  Your other option is to throw the pear under the boiler which will also work!  Oh and if you find yourself in Charleston during pear season, do yourself a favor and order this dish!

Poached Pear Salad with Blue Cheese and Cranberry (makes 2 small salads)

For the poached pear:

1 Bartlett Pear, peeled and halved

1/2 c. sugar

2 c. water

1 cinnamon stick

1 tbsp vanilla extract

1/8 c. superfine sugar

For salad:

2 handfuls assorted greens

1/4 c. shelled pistachios 

1/3 c. dried cranberries

1/3 c. good quality blue cheese, crumbled

balsamic syrup for drizzling

1. For the poached pear: combine sugar, water, cinnamon stick and vanilla extract in a medium saucepan over medium high heat.  Stir until sugar is dissolved.  Bring mixture to a light simmer and add pear.  Reduce heat to low and cook for 35 minutes, until pear is tender.  Remove saucepan from heat and set aside to cool, about 45 minutes to 1 hour.
2. Remove pear from syrup and top with superfine sugar.  With a creme brulee torch, torch the sugar to create a caramelized crust.  If you don’t have a torch, set your  broiler to high and broil pears until sugar caramelizes.
3. Assembly:  place greens on each salad plate and top with pear.  Add piles of pistachio, cranberry and blue cheese and drizzle with balsamic syrup.  Serve immediately.